On the eve of big school – a letter to my Love Bug

I’m not sure where to start. At the beginning maybe? Because it feels like yesterday. Everyone says to hold onto the every moment with your bubba because time will fly. What everyone neglected to tell me was that time occurs at the speed of light. Or maybe even faster.

You ran around the playground with glee on Friday having just spent an hour alone with your new teacher. I hope that wonder, excitement and joy continues throughout your education. I hope you are challenged and rewarded and supported, cared for, care for others and remember to have fun.

There will be times you feel overwhelmed. Talk to me when those times happen. It’s a mumma’s prerogative to allocate one day each term as a mental health day. A day when a kid needs a break from the world of school. That day we might stay in our pj’s all day. Or we might go to the beach or the park and run, ride bikes, scooter and do cartwheels. Whatever you need that day, I’ll be by your side. Remember to have fun. I know I have just repeated myself but it’s really important. Really important.

Speaking of being in the park, being outside is essential for us. Run, skip, jump, climb, hang upside down on the monkey bars. If you fall I’ll kiss you better. Put your feet on the earth, dig your toes into the grass or the sand or the dirt. Lay on your back and watch the clouds go by, or count the stars. Wade in the water. Sit and listen to the waves crash on the shore.

Be one with this incredible world that you love so much. Be kind to it. There is no back up plan. I’m sorry we are leaving it in such a state for you kids, but when I watch you and the way you are, I know it is in wonderful hands.

I’ll do everything I can to foster your love of all animals. Continue to stand up for them in the way only a gorgeous five year old can. It’s okay to be different. It’s okay to have different belief systems to other people. I hope no-one ever puts you down for your choices and, even if they do, that you are able to respond with kindness.

It pains me to my core so to know that at some point in the first part of your school life you will learn what true heartbreak is. If I could protect you from it I would without hesitation. I’d take your heartbreak and mine if I could. Dogs don’t live as long as we do. It doesn’t seem fair, and it isn’t. Bella and Beary adore you, as you do them. The three of us are looking forward to picking you up from school and walking you home.

Now, about school. Learning is important. Applying yourself is important. Trying your hardest is important. Sometimes all of those things don’t add up to amazing grades though. For whatever reason. Sometimes things just don’t click. We’ll try to work it out together but I don’t want you to ever worry if you really can’t do something. That is okay. It really, really is. I will always be proud of you no matter what. Because I will know that you have tried your hardest and done your best.

Your new teacher {and all of the other kindergarten teachers too} are so lucky to have you in their class. They are kindergarten teachers because they LOVE having a room full of bright, enthusiastic kids like you starting off at school. We’re super lucky to have them too. You’re going to a great school where there is a wonderful sense of community, for both of us.

I cried today when Luke and you gave each other a cuggle goodbye after your play date and wished each other fun for school. We have been so incredibly lucky that you have made such gorgeous friends at preschool. Some of them we will be friends with for always, but I’d be lying if I didn’t say that a whole lot of me wishes that you were all going to kindergarten together. You have other friends going and I know you will make lots of new friends, but I understand it is all a little daunting and unknown right now.

Keep talking to me. Talk to me about anything. The good, the bad, the funny, the sad. I’m all ears and all yours. There are also a couple of fuzzy heads at home who really love your cuggles and {trust me on this one} they don’t mind if you cry into their furs.

As I ironed the labels on your school clothes tonight {yes, we do actually have an iron – it’s in the laundry cupboard if anyone’s looking for it!} I wondered how this came about so soon. I looked at those uniforms which in my hands look so small but on you they seem ridiculously big and I had to bite back my tears.

I’m not sad that you are five. I’m actually really proud of us that we got to five and for the most part we are in awesome shape. I am sad that you are about to enter a really big world that I will no longer be the centre of. Oh, I know I’ll always be your favourite mumma, but there are other people who are really going to blow you away. As much as that’s a good thing, it still makes me a little sad. Because you’re myLove Bug. You’re the kid I have always loved ferociously. The kid I wanted so much that I went out and did it on my own so that I wouldn’t miss out on being a mumma. That I wouldn’t miss out on things like ironing labels on uniforms.

I’m also a little sad that this is the only time I will be a kindy mumma. I wish so much you could have had a sibling or two. You would make a wonderful big sister. I know other people think that too, it’s probably why your friends say you can share their younger siblings. Keep being that beautiful friend.

Putting you to bed tonight, 30-something hours before you start school, was an epic battle. We have been through quite a bit of this lately. I don’t know the reason for this change in behaviour. I try not to let my head take me anywhere awful. I have changed your diet to cut out things that might not be helping. We talk. We practice our breathing. We lay still and connected to the moment we are in. We are talking a lot about school. Are we talking too much about it? I don’t know.

There have been times lately that I have wondered what the hell I’ve done wrong to make you so cross. But we are on the same team. I am your team. I will always be your team. We will get through this together. We will battle in future I’m sure. You will look at me and wonder what ancient world I am living in to not understand the one in which you are currently existing. You know what, though? I will do my very best to understand. I will support you, empathise with you, listen to you, consider you. Sometimes we’ll find a happy medium. And sometimes – because I’m the mumma – I will make a decision that you don’t like but that you are just going to have to deal with it. I will make it with only your best interests at heart. Just like I’ve made every decision so far. Those times you might want to talk to anyone other than me. That’s okay too. That’s when grandmas, aunties, uncles fairy godmothers and mummas of your best friends come into their own!

The world ahead of us is amazing and wonderful and terrifying and scary and funny and bright and cloudy and filled with rainbows. Some days it’s all of those things at once. Embrace it my precious girl. Hold your arms wide open and wrap them around it as tight as you can.

I am insanely proud of the phenomenal kid you are. Continue to be brave, bold and kind. Have a great first day at kindergarten my lovely school girl. See you at pick up time!

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How far you both have come in 5 short years. What a beautiful letter. She is going to do incredible things because of your amazing parenting. And getting cross with you is part of growing and being her own person. Hard to accept (I want to slap her sometimes – but I dont), and an essential part of the process. “Our children are not our children. They are the sons and daughters of life longing to be free.”